The Development of the Letterbox
In the pre-post box era, there have been two main means of delivering a letter; senders can be necessitated to create their mail to your Receiving House, or would await the Bellman. The latter would patrol the streets, collecting post from your community. In order to distinguish himself, and make his presence known, the Bellman dons a uniform and sound familiar.
It is at 1852 how the suggestion of road-side boxes finally became a reality, with a trial proposed for your Channel Islands. Three cast-iron pillar boxes were installed on Jersey to try out the modern system.
The success of the experiment resulted in a different four being installed on Guernsey, one of these now forms part with the British Postal Museum & Archive collection. Letter boxes then began appearing for the mainland as of 1853.
However, there is to date no universal pillar box design that were currently familiar. Design and manufacture was with the discretion of local authorities, and it was in 1859 that attempts were designed to standardise the structures.
Horizontal slits took over as favoured option over vertical ones, and took over as the norm in letterbox design. Further improvements upon the main included the addition in the protruding cap to shield the contents through the elements.
As of 1859, the lamp ended up being to be accessible in 2 sizes; a bigger and wider size for highly populated areas, and a smaller Australian made security letterboxes version for elsewhere. However, the standardised pillar boxes did not receive universal acclaim. It was against the backdrop of which criticism that this Liverpool Special was formulated.
This prompted the Post Office (opened in 1861) to make another standard letter box in 1866. Again, this is not really a huge success and so, an extra design started in 1879. This final design may be the one with which were used to today. It was 24 months prior to this how the iconic red colour from the post boxes became a standard feature.
Before on this occasion, preferred colour option was green so that you can blend in with the green British pastures. However, from a barrage of complaints the structures were to challenging to locate because of their camouflage, it turned out agreed that bright red was the most suitable choice. The programme of re-painting lasted for about decade.
For the population in particular, the introduction and refinement of letter boxes enhanced the ability for sending and receiving mail effortlessly. With the exception of oversized parcel delivery, everyone was afforded access to your delivery service never before witnessed in Great Britain.